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Tissue Specificity in Social Context-Dependent lysozyme Expression in Bumblebees

Group living at high densities may result in the enhanced transmission of pathogens. Social insects are obligate group-living species, which often also exhibit high relatedness and frequent social interactions amongst individuals, resulting in a high risk of disease spread. Social species seem to ex...

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Autor principal: Lattorff, H. Michael G.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7148472/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32245075
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics9030130
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author Lattorff, H. Michael G.
author_facet Lattorff, H. Michael G.
author_sort Lattorff, H. Michael G.
collection PubMed
description Group living at high densities may result in the enhanced transmission of pathogens. Social insects are obligate group-living species, which often also exhibit high relatedness and frequent social interactions amongst individuals, resulting in a high risk of disease spread. Social species seem to exhibit immune systems that provide colonies of social insects with a certain level of flexibility for adjustment of immune activity according to the risk of disease spread. In bumblebees, Bombus terrestris, it was demonstrated that in group-kept individuals, immune component activity and immune gene expression is increased, potentially as a prophylactic adaptation. Here, I tested whether social environment influences the gene expression pattern of two lysozyme genes, which are components of the antimicrobial response of the bumblebee. In addition, I tested gene expression activation in different tissues (gut, fat body). The analysis revealed that the gene, the density of individuals, the tissue, and the interaction of the latter are the main factors that influence the expression of lysozyme genes. This is the first report of a tissue-specific response towards the social environment. This has implications for gene regulation, which must be responsive to social context-dependent information.
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spelling pubmed-71484722020-04-21 Tissue Specificity in Social Context-Dependent lysozyme Expression in Bumblebees Lattorff, H. Michael G. Antibiotics (Basel) Article Group living at high densities may result in the enhanced transmission of pathogens. Social insects are obligate group-living species, which often also exhibit high relatedness and frequent social interactions amongst individuals, resulting in a high risk of disease spread. Social species seem to exhibit immune systems that provide colonies of social insects with a certain level of flexibility for adjustment of immune activity according to the risk of disease spread. In bumblebees, Bombus terrestris, it was demonstrated that in group-kept individuals, immune component activity and immune gene expression is increased, potentially as a prophylactic adaptation. Here, I tested whether social environment influences the gene expression pattern of two lysozyme genes, which are components of the antimicrobial response of the bumblebee. In addition, I tested gene expression activation in different tissues (gut, fat body). The analysis revealed that the gene, the density of individuals, the tissue, and the interaction of the latter are the main factors that influence the expression of lysozyme genes. This is the first report of a tissue-specific response towards the social environment. This has implications for gene regulation, which must be responsive to social context-dependent information. MDPI 2020-03-20 /pmc/articles/PMC7148472/ /pubmed/32245075 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics9030130 Text en © 2020 by the author. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Lattorff, H. Michael G.
Tissue Specificity in Social Context-Dependent lysozyme Expression in Bumblebees
title Tissue Specificity in Social Context-Dependent lysozyme Expression in Bumblebees
title_full Tissue Specificity in Social Context-Dependent lysozyme Expression in Bumblebees
title_fullStr Tissue Specificity in Social Context-Dependent lysozyme Expression in Bumblebees
title_full_unstemmed Tissue Specificity in Social Context-Dependent lysozyme Expression in Bumblebees
title_short Tissue Specificity in Social Context-Dependent lysozyme Expression in Bumblebees
title_sort tissue specificity in social context-dependent lysozyme expression in bumblebees
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7148472/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32245075
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics9030130
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